New Lathe

I bought a 1949 South Bend 9" lathe.  It came with a cool but large and heavy (400-500lbs) stand built by the previous owner.  We couldn't figure out a way to get it into my basement until the seller thought of hiring a friend with this very useful knuckle crane.

The crane carried threaded the lathe and stand through my back yard, rolled it down a ramp into my basement, and delivered the package into my basement doorway.

This is a photo of the old lathe sitting on top of the new lathe just to give a size comparsion.  The old lathe could turn material up to 14" long, the new one has a 36" bed.  The new one is much more rigid and can take much deeper cuts in material.

The stand that I bought with the lathe is very nice.  It has a large stock rack on the back for holding metal, 9 drawers for holding tooling, and an open area below for larger items.

Published 27 April 2008 07:26 PM by AlexWetmore

Comments

# David said on 27 April, 2008 12:24 PM

What did the neighbors say?

When I first saw your top picture I thought you were going to tell us about a cable car ride you had been on!

# AlexWetmore said on 27 April, 2008 02:17 PM

Haven't talked to the neighbor's this morning.  Yesterday the kids who live behind us were having fun watching the crane going.

The whole procedure went pretty quickly.  I think the truck with the knuckle boom crane was here about an hour.

Hopefully we'll have remodelled our yard decades before I have to move this thing out of here.  The new yard plans call for a 3' wide ramp on one side which would make getting this out of here a lot easier.

# Mike Jenkins said on 27 April, 2008 03:01 PM

Nice acquisition.  South Bend always made nice stuff.  They made so many, I think there are still a lot of parts kicking around.

Just be real careful around all the open belting.  All the old guys had tales to tell about changing speeds on the fly.  Now that you have good brazing skills you may want to fab a guard or two.

# beth h said on 06 May, 2008 08:06 AM

A crane??!?

Okay. So now you Can't. Ever. Leave.

Congrats and enjoy.